A Gemini Tackles the Big Issues

Q: Which would you choose? Fame or fortune?

-from Susan, who is a Gemini and therefore unable or unwilling to choose

A:                    Artificial dichotomy.

A#2:                Why do I have to choose?

A#3:                Define ‘fame’ for this mid-list author.

        Fame = Someone - one person - told me I looked a little like Princess Diana

A#4:                Can fortune be defined as enough money to live on until I die?

A fortune is in the eyes of the beholder....

A#5:                I notice the conditional in the question, which suggests the questioner doesn’t think I’m likely to have to make this decision.

A#6:                Let me go back to daydreaming I could make a fortune by becoming an author famous for my French village mysteries, debuting in 2017. A girl can dream, can’t she?

I've Been Everywhere, Man

Where is the best place you’ve ever vacationed? Has that setting made its way into any of your books?

by Paul D. Marks

Like the Johnny Cash song says, I’ve been everywhere, man. Well, okay, not everywhere but a lot of wheres. Some places I like better than others, some I’d rather forget, some I wish I could move back to, and some, well, y’know, if I told you I’d have to kill ya.

Click here (not picture) for YouTube Video

In my prose writing, novels and short stories, it doesn’t appear that I’ve used much of my travels as locations, though I have in some cases. That’s probably because I consider myself a Los Angeles writer. So, even though “I’ve been everywhere, man,” much of what I write is set in L.A. (I have, however set some screenplays in more exotic locales but that’s for another time.) My novels White Heat and Vortex, and the five previously published stories in my collection LA Late @ Night are all L.A. stories, as are others. However, I do have some things that are set in other places: I’m currently working on a novel set in New York and another that starts in L.A., moves to DC and even England. And Deserted Cities of the Heart is coming out in Akashic’s St. Louis Noir on August 2nd and that’s set in, well, you guessed it, St. Louis. My story Poison Heart, in one of the Deadly Ink collections, is set at Morey’s Piers and Wildwood, New Jersey. A story that’s currently out for consideration is set in Atlanta, all places I’ve been. But it seems that the more exotic places I’ve been to haven’t made it into anything, probably because I write mystery-thrillers, but not international thrillers, at least not yet. And because, as I say, I largely consider myself an L.A. Writer.

L.A. City Hall

Raymond Chandler and Ross MacDonald did pretty good hangin’ around the L.A. area. As have James Ellroy and Walter Mosley. I’m not putting myself in their ranks, just saying that L.A. ain’t a bad place to hang your gat, I mean hat.

Famous Hollywood Landmark -- can be seen in LA Confidential

Some other places I’ve set stories are, Terminal Island, a former Japanese fishing village off the coast of San Pedro, so still sort of L.A., but when the story is set, during WWII, it was a very different place than L.A.  Howling at the Moon is set in Death Valley, and though that’s still in California and not all that far from L.A., it might as well be on the moon. Graceland is set in Memphis, at Elvis Presley’s home. Out of Time is set in Miami’s hip South Beach. Unfinished Business in Lynchburg, Virginia. I have several stories or parts of them set in Venice Beach, which again is part of L.A., but with a vibe of its own. And, as I say above, I’m currently working on novels set in DC, a place I love in many ways and can’t stand in others, and New York.

Dee Dee Ramone's grave

But I’d have to say the most exotic place I’ve set something is the Hollywood Forever Cemetery for the story Continental Tilt,  largely set in the heart of Hollywood, in the heart of L.A. Lots of famous people buried there, everyone from Dee Dee Ramone, of the Ramones, to Tyrone Power and Darla Hood (Our Gang/Little Rascals). Also Rudolph Valentino and Bugsy Siegel. Lotta ghosts there.

MGM’s motto, besides ars gratia artis, was “More stars than there are in heaven,” but Hollywood Forever has even more stars than MGM in its heyday, unfortunately they’re either six feet under or encased in marble above the ground. And I’m not sure they’re all in heaven…

The thing about Hollywood Forever is that during the summer months you, well, here’s a couple graphs from Continental Tilt to give you an idea. They’re separated from each other a bit in the story:

Hollywood Forever Cemetery

In the heart of Los Angeles, in the heart of Hollywood, a vampire movie played on a humongous silver screen. This wasn’t your usual movie venue, but the crowd of seven hundred loved it. Spread out on beach chairs and blankets, with bottles of wine and beer, Boba tea, doing wheatgrass shooters and eating catered Mexasian sushi, fusion food for the Millennial-iPod generation.

And a short time later:

Did I forget to mention that the movie theatre was the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in the heart of Hollyweird? That over the summer they show movies on the mausoleum wall, while people sit on their beach chairs and blankets—Beach Blanket Bloodshed—and munch their munchies amongst the graves of movie stars, rock stars and even mere mortals? The back wall of the cemetery, clearly visible from the field of graves the watchers watched the movies from, was appropriately the back wall of Paramount Studios.

Actually, I set two stories there, Continental Tilt and Endless Vacation. The latter is very different in tone (more downer) than the former.

In writing this, I was surprised to see how many places I’ve written about that aren’t set in L.A., and this isn’t even a complete list.

***

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Fantastic Tales from Fabulous Places.

By Catriona.

I think I'm one of those people Cathy talked about yesterday who doesn't hold travel high on the list of life's pleasures. (There's no one more surprised than me to find myself living so very far from my Scottish home.)

The tough life of a California resident

When I go on holiday, all I want is a cottage with no neighbours (or a hotel where no one bugs you), a quiet beach with no radios playing, a huge stack of books and somewhere to eat seafood.



Dream holiday cottage, with book stack.

It used to be Cornwall. Now it's a toss-up between Rhode Island (quiet) and the Monterey peninsula (handier).

I try to make myself care that I'll probably die without ever seeing the Great Wall of China or The Winter Palace. Boring? Guilty. Annoying to more intrepid friends? You bet. Bothered? Guess.

And when it comes to books I seem to be the same panacheless ninny. I write about the places I've lived for years and years and even then I have to go back to them while writing and commune with . . . I'm not sure exactly.

So my books are full off Edinburgh and Galloway and sometimes feature other corners of what is a truly tiny country. I worked in Leeds (about an hour's drive from the Scottish border) for five years and ten years later I managed to use it as a setting.

Leeds (or Dystopia, as one US librarian assumed!)

When I moved to California and was asked if I'd ever set a book here, I pish-poshed and pooh-poohed pretty vehemently.  Of course, I was wrong. A mere five years later, I have indeed written a story that takes place in a northern California town. Then straight back to Lanarkshire (a half hour's drive from the house where I was born) for the next one.

A traveler's tale or two...by Cathy Ace

Where is the best place you’ve ever vacationed? Has that setting made its way into any of your books?

Anyone who’s read a Cait Morgan Mystery knows how difficult it is for me to answer this question: all those books are set in places where I’ve lived or have visited frequently. The south of France, BC wine country, Pacific coastal Mexico, Vegas, Hawai’i, Amsterdam…I have spent years or months in all of them, and have often sneaked there for a short vacation too! And they are all in my books (Budapest is up next, by the way, folks!). My WISE Enquiries Agency Mysteries are set in Wales where I grew up, so there's that, too.

Yes, that's me floating in the Dead Sea

I’ve been fortunate to travel a great deal during my life. At least, I see it as fortunate – I know that, for many, travel isn’t something high on their personal agenda. So I’m going to talk about places I have visited and loved, which have not made their way into my work (yet!!).

Jordan: I adored Agatha Christie’s beloved Nabatean and Roman city of Petra where she lived for more than a year with her archaeologist husband, Max Mallowan; floating in the Dead Sea made me giggle (yes, the water tastes absolutely disgusting but being told that just isn’t the same as tasting it for oneself!); Amman’s amphitheatre is stunning; Jerash is about as perfect a Roman city as I have seen anywhere; Mount Nebo makes one feel utterly spiritual and the Crusader citadel of Kerak Castle took my breath away.  It was great fun to ride a camel through Wadi Rum, where the Seven Pillars of Wisdom frame the landscape.

Yep - it's me! At Petra, New Year's Eve

Tunisia: I decided I wanted to be at Carthage for my birthday one year. Having grown up studying Latin, it was a place that had filled my teen years with wonder. I managed it, and was bitterly disappointed! Yes, I know a city famous for being sacked will probably look a bit sorry for itself, but I’d hoped for more than remained, which boiled down to a few columns and the subterranean parts of the Roman baths. Fortunately the joy of visiting Tunis itself, with its wonderful Bardo Museum, made up for this underwhelming experience, as did a totally joyous trip to the village of Sid Bou Said, which is known for its blue and white architectural themes. I made the stupid mistake of buying a star-shaped lamp made of brass and glass there – given that it was about two-feet in diameter it made for a very interesting flight home!

Outside the museum in Cairo

Egypt: if I have to pick a favourite, this is it. I’ve spent a lot of time in Egypt (months), and there hasn’t been a moment I didn’t enjoy. No, hang on, I take that back….about fifteen minutes after sunset each night, a wall of hot air would roll across the Nile and hit you like a giant hairdryer, followed about ten minutes later by swarms of the most nibbly mosquitoes I’ve ever experienced – those moments…running to find the respite of the hotel’s air-conditioning…weren’t much fun at all! I’ve cruised the Nile, visited Agatha Christie’s suite at the Old Cataract Hotel at Aswan, clambered up inside the pyramid of Cheops in Cairo and have stood in the Temple of Karnak at dawn on Midsummer’s Day. I had the magnificently-painted tomb of Queen Nefertari all to myself for half an hour on the morning of my 35th birthday and I’ve ridden through the

Tip: don't wear black when you're on a motorbike in Egypt in August

Valleys of the Kings and Queens on a motorbike in August (not recommended unless you fill a back-pack with water to pour over yourself!). Sailing in a felucca on the Nile to its tiny islands is a delight, as is taking a horse-drawn kalesh (a small, open carriage) to dine at the Winter Palace in Luxor where they have some of the the most magnificently unnecessary fireplaces I’ve ever seen. To balance that luxurious experience I also drank tea made from Nile-water and ate goat stew in a traditional mud house, sharing a hookah pipe with my hosts afterwards…an interesting breakfast!

Apple shisha - my favourite!

I’m not sure if any of these places will find their way into my future books, but I’ve loved them all, and hope to return one day. Where have you been that you'd like to revisit? 

Cathy Ace writes the WISE Enquiries Agency Mysteries (book #2 THE CASE OF THE MISSING MORRIS DANCER was published in hardback in February, and will be available in trade paperback on August 31st, and the Cait Morgan Mysteries (book #7 THE CORPSE WITH THE GARNET FACE was published in paperback in April). Find out more about Cathy and her work, and sign up for her newsletter at http://cathyace.com/    

A Little Witchcraft

-from Susan

I’m taking a break from the Criminal Minds Q&A today to give a special shout-out to the July 7^th launch of my friend and New York Times bestselling author JulietBlackwell’s newest book in her Witchcraft series set in San Francisco. If you haven’t read any of Lily’s adventures with her potbellied pig Oscar, who is also…well, I don’t want to ruin the surprise if you haven’t met him yet.

A Toxic Trousseau lands Lily, who runs what must surely be San Francisco’s liveliest vintage clothing store, in a new dilemma. Even the most skilled sorceress can’t ward off a lawsuit, and Lily is not at her enchanting best with her hands full as the temporary leader of San Francisco's magical community. So after her potbellied pig Oscar head-butts rival clothier Autumn Jennings, Lily tries to make peace without a costly personal injury case.

But any hope of a quiet resolution is shattered when Autumn turns up dead. As one of the prime suspects, Lily searches for a way to clear her name and discovers a cursed trousseau among Autumn’s recently acquired inventory. Lily must deal with a mysterious dogwalker and spend the night in a haunted house as she delves into the trunk’s treacherous past. She’s got to figure out who wanted to harm Autumn fast, before the curse claims another victim.

Sound like fun? Sounds like a great summer read to me.

So Many Books, So Little Time

Once you start a book, do you feel compelled to finish it? If not, what causes you to put it down?

by Paul D. Marks

No!

And ditto for movies.

I used to feel not only compelled but obligated to finish any book I started. (Okay, a little compulsive I know.) But as I’ve gotten older that just doesn’t work anymore. Life is too short. There’s too many books and too little time, as has been noted here all week. I won’t even say there’re too many good books, because I won’t claim that every book I finish—and even like—is a “good” book. It might just be something I enjoy. A guilty pleasure.

I read a variety of things, non-fiction and fiction and various genres within that. These days I don’t often read a non-fiction book cover to cover like I used to. I bounce around, sometimes looking at the table of contents or the index for subjects I might find particularly interesting. And sometimes I just open to a page and start reading.

Fiction is, of course, different. You really have to read it from head to tail if you want to get the full flavor and depth of it. I’ll usually give a book about 80-100 pages. But I have to admit that I might read beyond that even if I’m not enjoying the book because hope springs eternal. And I guess I still have that expectation that it will get better. Unfortunately on some books I’ll read all 400 pages until hope turns to despair.

For movies, I’ll give them about a half hour. That should take me to the end of Act I, give or take. If it doesn’t grab me by then: bye-bye.

However, when I’ve been a judge for various competitions I have felt obligated to read every story from stem to stern. And I’ve pretty much succeeded at that, though it can be extremely time-consuming. But I have to admit there was one story that I just couldn’t finish. Because it wasn’t a “story” but more of a political diatribe disguised as a story and the characters were just mouthpieces for the author. But one clunker out of the tons I’ve read for various contests isn’t a bad batting average I’d say.

There is one very well-known book that I have been unable to finish. Three times. Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon. I really want to read this book and I really want to like it. But I can’t seem to get past page 100. But maybe the fourth time (if there is one) will be the charm. Or maybe I should just read Gravity’s Rambo instead (and no, I didn’t make that cover).

And like Catriona mentioned yesterday, sometimes I’ve started a book and for one reason or another just couldn’t get into it. Picked it up later and wow, what have I been missing.

A book doesn’t have to be a fast-paced, rip-roaring page turner either. One of my favorite books is The Tartar Steppe by Dino Buzzati, about a soldier who is stationed at a remote outpost and spends his life hoping and waiting for the glory of battle. Though that’s really just what it’s about on the surface. Now, I admit this book is a slow read, so you’d think I would have stopped at some point. But I just loved it and it’s well worth the slowness in my opinion.

On another note, I don’t always finish novels or stories I start to write, but I guess that’s for another time.

***

Here are some pictures from my book signing last week with Pam Ripling at The Open Book in Valencia:

And my radio interview at KHTS AM 1220. Click here for the podcast.

www.PaulDMarks.com

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Buried in Books (and it's a lovely way to go).

By Catriona

Do I always finish a book I've started? And if not, what makes me lay it down?

No. Ever since I first got my three orange library tickets, I've now and then failed to finish reading the books I've chosen.

What's changed is whether I feel particularly guilty. See that last paragraph? See that word "failed"? That's as neutral as I can get it; "flaked out" and "fell short" went through my head too. Oh, I used to beat myself up something chronic about not finishing books. The BR pile (being read) was as tall as the TBR pile. And the BR pile was big lie. All it did was use up bookmarks, as I kept my place year after year in books that I was never going to go back to. These days I admit it and reshelve the books. (Why not donate them? Keep reading and see.)

As to what makes me give up? Well, I think joyful reading is a three-legged stool: there's the book, the reader and the moment.

I'm sure there are bad books. Somewhere sometime a book must have been published that no one liked enough to finish. I don't think I've ever stopped reading because I was turning the pages of a bad book, though. I turned thirteen pages of 50 SHADES OF GREY and gave up on page fourteen. But 46,472 and counting people liked it enough to tell Amazon.

And I'm not a perfect reader. I'm uninterested in some things (Middle Earth, for instance). My heart sinks when faced with some things (long poems, for instance. Anything much longer than a sonnet pretty much makes me glaze over. Poems that go over the page to the next page leave me behind.)
But I'm not self-regarding enough to think The Lord of The Rings and Paradise Lost are no good because they're no good for me. So I wasn't that surprised when I used Simon Armitage's Sir Gawain and The Green Knight as a bookmark park for a year and a half.

But then there's that third thing - the moment. The season, the day of the week, the time of the day, what you read last, what you're writing, whether the world seems to be going to hell in a handcart all around you and no one has noticed . . . there are so many ways a reading experience can be derailed.
And the proof of it is when a book I tried and failed with (Failed I tell you! Failed like a big honking FAILURE) comes back in another guise and shows itself to be delightful.

I've lost count of the number of times I've been handed a moderating gig , or even an interviewing gig, and on my bookshelf is something by one of the panelists (or the sole interviewee) that I started and laid down unfinished. I pick it up again and adore it! Devour it! Buy the backlist and bore everyone on Facebook with how fantabulous this author is.

Nothing ever makes me feel like a bigger idiot than realizing that I had treasure on my bookshelf and didn't know.

Of final chapters and zombies by Cathy Ace

 "Once you start a book, do you feel compelled to finish it? If not, what causes you to put it down?"

Once upon a time, the answer to this would have been – “I always finish what I’ve started” but, recently, I find I’m having to allow myself to not finish a book I’ve begun. It’s a pretty alien concept to me – like not clearing my plate. Ingrained absolutes are tough to shake.

Books were so precious to me for most of my life (and still are, don’t get me wrong!) that it would be anathema to me to not work through to the end of a volume to complete the journey the author planned for me to take. Now? Not so much. Now I find my reading time is so much shorter than it used to be, and I have to read so much because of “authorly” commitments, that reading for pure pleasure has become something where I need to be grabbed by the book as soon as possible and not let go until the last page or – yes – I’ll wander off and find someone else who can give me that fix before I reach the final chapters

.

Waiting for a long vacation

 By week two of a two-week vacation I might be able to face a book with le Carre’s stately pace, but in week one I’m smashing through the Pattersons and Childs like a crazy person with smart characters, quite-but-strong types and high body counts littering my waking hours in a blaze of joyous entertainment-crime. Then I can stop, and allow the pace to slow into a panoply of nuanced ne’er-do-wells, all of whom shouldn’t be trusted further than I can dribble. Lovely!

Now all I need is a month off, and I’ll be enjoying Jane Austen all over again. (I recently watched the movie “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” and LOVED it! Yep, there were plot-holes, and the lines from Austen’s pen dripped slowly from the mouths of zombie-killing characters, but, overall, it was great fun. I couldn’t manage the book when it came out though. Yes, the zombie-version of Pride & Prejudice was too slow for me!)

And that’s about where I am with reading at the moment: if it ain’t grabbing me right away, I won’t finish it. But, oh, to have the time to luxuriate in the manners of the Bennet sisters without worrying that they gained their zombie-fighting skills in China not Japan? That will mean I’m having a real break! And finishing every book I pick up. But maybe not too many of them will be about zombies. 

Are zombies or spies your kind of thing? If neither - what keeps you turning the pages until you're at the back cover?

Cathy Ace writes the WISE Enquiries Agency Mysteries (book #2 THE CASE OF THE MISSING MORRIS DANCER was published in hardback in February, and book #1 THE CASE OF THE DOTTY DOWAGER was published in trade paperback on March 1st) and the Cait Morgan Mysteries (book #7 THE CORPSE WITH THE GARNET FACE was published in paperback in April). Find out more about Cathy and her work, and sign up for her newsletter at http://cathyace.com/